


Speak in Tongues

by Jay_Wells



Series: The Odd Life of Alexander Hamilton [3]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - 1970s, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, French Creole, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Nevis, Poverty, Prejudice Against Non-English Speakers, domestic abuse, tobacco
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-30
Updated: 2016-04-30
Packaged: 2018-06-05 12:56:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6705292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jay_Wells/pseuds/Jay_Wells
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>James Hamilton teaches his children that to speak Creole is wrong.</p><p>Elizabeth Hamilton reminds her husband that there is beauty in any language</p>
            </blockquote>





	Speak in Tongues

_“Mama, mwen te resevwa yon etwal lò nan klas jodi a! Pwofesè a di mwen se yon ekriven bon.”_ Alexander ran into the house, waving his essay around so that the light glints off the gold foil star secured just under his name. Just then, the strong scent of tobacco and beer hit his nose and he recoiled. Whenever Da drank, the house became hell. James, struggling to catch up with his heavy book bag on his back crashed into him, and they both tumbled to the floor.

 _“Kisa ou ap fe, estipid?”_ he started, and then he smelled it too. James, being the older of the two, had had more time to develop survival instincts, and urged Alexander, “Speak English, Alex!”

 _“Poukisa?”_ Alexander was confused. They always spoke Creole at home, unless they were addressing Da. And Da was busy right now nursing his hangover with a cup of coffee. _“Mwen pa bezwen, èske mwen?”_

Da spun around and stared down at him, red-eyed, “What did you say?”

“Nothing, Da.” Alexander realised his mistake about five seconds after he made it. “I mean--”

“ _Nothing?_ ” Da crouches down so that Alexander can smell the booze on his breath. His cigarette breathed in between his index and middle fingers of the hand resting on his knee. “You’re speaking about me again, boy, in those tongues of yours. Tell me what you said.”

“It was really nothing, Da.” Alexander struggled to find the right words to defuse his drunk father. “I was just confused -- I never speak about you but in English, honest.”

 _He’s not really going to hit me,_ he thought. _He’ll apologise for this later, and then everyone will get along again._

Alexander knew his father was a good man, just not when he was drunk. His father loved him, and he couldn’t provoke him now. He barely noticed James stepping between them and standing with all the courage an eight-year-old could muster.

“Don’t touch Alex!” James pushed Da, throwing the man off-balance. Da windmilled his arms in an attempt to catch his balance, and his cigarette caught James right on the collarbone. James cried out, “Ouch!”

Da fell flat, eyes wide with horror and concern. “Jemmy -- ”

James flinched away from him, frightened. “No!”

Alexander was shaking. He saw the light puckering burn on his brother, the guilty cigarette in Da’s hand and the open beer on the counter. His father was drunk. He was smoking. He had burned James. James was afraid. Da was sorry … but the cigarette was still in his hand. He was still a threat. “Mama!”

Mama, alarmed by the ruckus, ran in through the back door calling, “Children? Children, where are you?”

When she saw her sons, one injured the other crying, both looking fearfully at her husband, she knew what had happened and rage welled up in her breast. “You _kochon!_ What did you do?”

Da bristled. “It was an accident, Rachel. I lost my balance, and I hit him. I didn’t mean to!”

“Does that take the mark off him?” Mama said. “Boys, come here.”

They scampered behind her and clutched her hands. Da stood up, dropped his cigarette on the floor and stomped it into submission, then flung his bottle across the kitchen. Alexander whimpered and pressed his face against his mother’s thigh. Mama didn’t flinch.

“Are you done?” she asked.

He didn’t move toward them, and it felt like the kitchen had become a war zone, one side Mama’s, one side Da’s, and it was clear who had the upper hand.

 _“Boys, go upstairs and don’t move until I come for you.”_ she said.

Alexander stayed frozen until James wrapped a warm hand around his wrist and drug him far enough the stairs that Mama and Da couldn’t see them, but where they could still hear.

Mama spoke first. “You’re pathetic, you know that? It’s three o’clock, and your children are _right there._ They look up to you, so you better start acting like a responsible adult.”

“How about you quit your gibberish when you talk to the boys.” Da snapped. “It’s a bullshite language, anyway.”

“It is a _fine_ language,” she said. “Just because you choose not to learn other languages doesn’t invalidate them.” There was a pause and then the creaking of the front door being opened. “Leave. And don’t come back until you’re sober.”

“This is my house!”

“It’s paid for with _my_ paycheck, maintained by _me._ The children, who _I_ take care of, live here,” she said. “You want a claim to it? Either get a job or take help care of the children. Otherwise, leave.”

“I’ll get a job, all right,” he said, “and when I do, things are going to change here. Starting with your attitude.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard that before,” she said. “I’m still here. Get out.”

The door slammed shut, and Alexander heard his mother sigh, followed by the refrigerator opening and sounds of sloshing and glass clinking against each other. It went on for a long time, and Alexander fell asleep against James’ side.

He woke up to Mama tucking him into bed. “Mama?”

She paused, hand resting on his forehead. “Yes, Alex?”

“Can I have some water?” he said.

“Of course, baby.” She got up, and he tottered after her.

James was already downstairs struggling with his math homework. He was working on multiplication tables, something first-grader Alexander had mastered the day after he brought them home. Alexander sat down next to him while his mother turned on the tap.

“Do you want help?” He pointed to the problem James’ pencil was hovering over. _Twelve times twelve equals …_

James flushed. “No.”

Mama handed him the glass. The water inside was warm. “Thank you, Mama.”

She ruffled his hair. “Jem, dear, why don’t you do your homework at the kitchen table? Alex, you feel warm. Go upstairs and lie down.”

Alexander took his glass and went upstairs to nap.

When he came back to return his glass to the sink, the radio was playing Stevie Wonder and Mama was sitting next to James and helping him with his homework. Mama was good at math. He crept back up the stairs and made sure to make a lot of noise coming back down.

 

Da returned three days later, sober, with one hundred dollars, a job at the local grocery and one request: no more speaking Creole. At a hundred dollars a week, Mama couldn’t refuse.

When he lost that job five weeks later for being drunk, he refused to rescind his demand. No one spoke Creole in the house anymore, and anytime Alexander slipped up, his mother and brother shot him a look.

Alexander didn’t think it was fair that Da got to decide what he spoke, but there wasn’t much he could do about it. What Da said, went.  After his father beat him for it once, he never needed to be told again.

He would have to wait for things to get back to normal.

**Author's Note:**

> $100 (then) = $576.65 (present)


End file.
